


A Slow Dance

by Miyo02



Category: 86-エイティシックス- - 安里 アサト | 86 - Asato Asato
Genre: Character Study, Dorks in Love, F/M, Fluff, Heart-to-Heart, Light Angst, Romance, Shinei "Shin" Nouzen is a Dork, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Vladilena "Lena" Milizé is a Dork
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:34:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27979665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miyo02/pseuds/Miyo02
Summary: They are two very different individuals, living in the same world, having different perspectives, trying to grasp each other. But maybe the key in this relationship is to not just meet at the same point only to clash nor be beside each other in a single path that can never exist… But to dance slowly, to face each other eye to eye, and try to sway to the same rhythm without letting go.A Slow Dance: A compilation of unrelated ShinLena drabbles and shorts with different themes[Some chapters may contain minor spoilers until Volume 6]
Relationships: Vladilena "Lena" Milizé/Shinei "Shin" Nouzen
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7





	A Slow Dance

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I just finished binge-reading volumes 1 to 6 this week and I just fell in love with the series. I'm so happy to have tried it! The fan content count is still lonely and I hope that the anime will eventually change that.
> 
> This is my first time to write for a really small fandom so I'll just have fun right now. Thanks for clicking this. (For my readers and subscribers, I'm not abandoning my BNHA fics. It's just really hard to get into the headspace of writing fluff when the current arc is heavy)
> 
> This fic will be a collection of random drabbles and short stuff. I'll try to mark each chapter with the content and warnings if needed. For Chapter 1, yes, minor spoilers for Volume 6.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

“Shi—n…?”

His nickname is just a syllable and to think that such a precious thing she aimed to be able to say one day comes out of her mouth in the clumsiest way? Lena never thought that’s possible until her very own lips betrayed her now.

Shin, who is standing right beside her that summer evening, underneath the dark blanket of the heavens, doesn’t show any sign of being bothered by the stutter and bent of doubt in her voice. If he did, no word nor even a simple raise of a brow comes from him. He just looks at her, still wordlessly, but acknowledging that she had called him even when it’s just the two of them right now.

After the series of missions with losses and gains, they are given a few days off to just relax (or to try to at least). Currently, they are staying in one of Ernst's villas not that far from the capital. After a long day with the rest of the Strike Package, it's just an evening for both of these two who made it a point to spend time together by just talking; similar to their evening exchanges back in the Eighty-Sixth sector, but this time in person and not through Para-RAID.

Contrary to the ever-composed young man, Lena finds the whole thing that just unfolded quite bothersome. Aside from the lack of grace, the uncontrollable squeak in her voice is just something to frown upon. But more than that, what makes it really annoying is how the words floating in her mind somehow reflect not her own thoughts and feelings but mostly the people around her.

For some reason, lately, everyone surrounding her (regardless of rank, position, and affiliation with her) keep on bringing up Shin in different circumstances. As a commander, it’s her job to analyze and strategize to turn the tables in any peril of a situation. She carries not only the responsibility of such a job but the objectives of missions and the lives of the soldiers through her commands and reasons. Yet, when it comes to these things, to _humans_ , oddly, she finds herself thinking and thinking, wondering and wondering what exactly is what.

Lena could not see a specific pattern. Maybe if it was only the Eighty-Six who brought up Shin regularly, it would not affect her like this. It’s already in their nature to talk about the infamous Grim Reaper who can hear the ghosts of the battlefield and vowed to carry the Eighty-Six wherever he chose to lie and rest. But of course, more than being a reaper, the Eighty-Six’s (especially Raiden, Theo, Kurena, and Anju’s) view of Shin is something more than she could ever imagine. They are comrades who’ve survived not just the battles with the Legion but their own battles against discrimination and cruelty. It may not be a stretch to call them a whole family too, even if not bound by blood. Their bond, Lena thinks, is something she can never penetrate despite succeeding in fighting together with them. Yet it’s something she cherishes and respects all at the same time. And so, the joy of being regarded as their equal when they tell her stories about Shin and their other days, is just something that fills her with warmth.

That happiness is beside the point of her current turmoil right now.

To have even the fifth prince of the United Kingdom of Roa Garcia, Vika, and the Federacy’s Lt. Colonel Grethe Wenzel bring up the captain? And again in random encounters? Annette, being Shin’s childhood friend brings him up but probably not to the extent that others have done.

She shakes her head, long silver hair following the movement with unintended elegance even if it’s a rushed action. She should stop spitting names in her mind when technically, everyone has (at least once) brought up Shin to her randomly regardless of the topic or occasion.

It’s not that talking about Shin itself is bothering her. Even if no one talks about him, her thoughts would naturally fly to him anyway even before they met in person after the Republic’s fall. There is nothing wrong with talking about Shin at all. The problem is…

_It’s me. I’m the problem._

The thing is, Lena doesn’t even know why she’s thinking of these things. Maybe it’s the way Theo rubbed in the fact that Shin’s been looking at his hands lately and Raiden seemed to imply that it’s something "unusual." Her thoughts immediately ran to the direction of worry and missed the knowing smiles of the two Processors. But what stemmed from worry turned to an odd mix of curiosity and fascination.

Over the course of two days before the vacation, as they stayed for paperworks and strategy meetings at the capital, Lena found herself with a new habit that is now difficult to break – looking at his hands.

The hands of an Eighty Six. The hands of a soldier. The hands of someone seemingly being called and summoned to the battlefield of lost voices. The hands of someone who has claimed lives for mercy. The hands of someone who’s kept arms all the time.

Despite knowing these things about him, whenever her silver eyes glance at it, all she sees is the hands of Shinei “Shin” Nouzen. Not of an Eighty-Six. Not of a Grim Reaper.

And something bubbles inside of her every time.

_I wonder what it’s like to hold his hand._

“Lena.”

His firm call startles her even if the way he says it is so careful and fitting for the late night. It’s similar to someone’s attempt to check if a person’s really asleep; not too loud to wake in case, but not too soft to be unheard.

Her shoulders’ jolt gets more reaction from him, something she didn’t mean to draw out of his crimson eyes at the moment: Concern.

“Are you alright?” He leans a bit closer, crossing the arms-length distance they had a while ago.

“Y-Yeah.” Of course, the stammer’s not very convincing plus the way she avoided his gaze by suddenly looking at the ground; her clasped hands in front of her coming to view.

But before he can even ask her what’s wrong, she says it. “Are your hands okay?”

“Nn… Huh?” The confusion and probably hesitation are obvious in his voice. Even without Para-RAID, she can tell that and it must because the question itself is quite weird. Lena tries to save herself.

“Raiden… and the others told me that you’ve been looking at your hands. And I started… thinking if something’s bothering you. Is your grip fine? Are your hands shaky? Tired?” Dropping the part that she’s been looking at his hands lately too, Lena focuses on him and his face that's trying to read her. She isn’t a medical expert but somehow, when it comes to Shin, his health and wellbeing come automatically to her. Even if doctors confirm he’s well and fit to work, Lena at times can’t stop thinking of the after-effects of battle and the restless voices that only he could hear as long as he's awake.

Shin blinks at her, probably not expecting it (cause she too, didn’t expect she’d be asking this to him one day) but he looks at his hand, slightly raising it just to his front at the level of his chest. It dawns Lena that even if she's been keeping a close eye on him, she really hasn't seen him stare at his hand just like now. _Which is weird..._

As he looks down, she could see his short lashes flutter slightly. “Not really.”

 _Then?_ She doesn’t say it and she keeps her lips shut, not pushing him, but just waiting for him to continue at his own pace.

“I don’t understand it myself.”

Lena watches him, looking for traces of hidden anguish or pain but with the way he looks at his hand, it seems that he just do not really have the answer right now. Probably, he needs time to collect his thoughts. She couldn’t understand it herself when he himself can’t either and Lena has learned that talking with Shin doesn’t always mean that they have to solve everything about anything _now_. So she shifts the topic to something different but related.

“Well, if you aren’t feeling pain, that’s good,” she says beaming. It’s her turn to look at her own hand, so pale that the light of the moon bounces off her Alba skin. “Annette says my hands are cold.”

It’s probably in one of those times they shopped back it the Republic’s walls. Annette had commented that when she pulled Lena, who was a bit distracted by the airing news, out of the crowd.

“I think my fingertips just easily adapt the current temperature,” she says mindlessly, raising that hand and blocking the moon for a bit that’s staring at both of their figures at the balcony.

It seems like a miracle to think that after everything, she’s now beside Shin when they were kilometers away from each other when she’s still _Major Milizé_ and he was _Captain Nouzen_. It may not be the fireworks that they promised to see together, but the moon itself is quite a magnificent witness to them. The breeze disrupts her thoughts and blows on her hair, letting it flow like long waves of fairy dust. Shin’s shorter dark strands start to sway with the wind as well, framing the contours of his face. She should really shield her eyes because of the wind but she still chooses to look at him bathe in the moonlight.

Realizing how long she's been staring at him, she looks at the moon again, missing his gesture of shying away from her gaze.

Contrary to the heat of the sun this summer, the nights are still quite chilly, and just when she’s about to tell him her fingertips’ chill, he opens his palm right before her.

Lena’s eyes blink at it, seeing the etched lines of his palm and the small scars be emphasized by the moonlight. She looks at him, the confusion not leaving her features at all, especially when he's not looking at her right now.

Shin glances at her, only his left eye moving, his face still pointed towards the moon.

"...?" She looks at his hand that's closer to her face and looks at him back to search for answers.

He sighs, quite different from his usual when he wants to resign himself. It's a different kind of sigh that she couldn't interpret at the moment when she's too confused.

“Do you want to use my hand?”

“Use… your hand?”

Shin is now facing her and he looks so serious with the offer but after she repeated his words, somehow this uneasy look fills his face and he retracts it. “Nevermind.”

“H-Huh?”

He directs his stare to the crescent body of light in the darkness and she gets to look at his side profile being outlined by the pale light once again. From this view, the red color of his eyes isn’t evident, almost blending with the color of the night and despite her being startled by his gaze earlier, she still prefers to drown in that warm color even if her face becomes all tingly in and gets painted in the same shade.

Lena’s still learning who Shin is. But she knows that if they leave a lot of things unsaid, not because of unknowingness but because of hesitance, it would just cause more blur. How many times have both of them suppress something deep inside them, only for it to blow up into a clash?

She decided to take it slow, to consider him and his little steps. But taking it slow does not mean staying on the same place without moving at all. And taking it slow also means aiding him when he found the courage.

_So this time…_

“May I… hold your hand?”

To say that she isn’t nervous now would be a tremendous lie. She isn’t keeping a face right now after all. It’s just her, Shin, and the moon in one of the villas, with the Federacy buildings and establishments beneath them, being lifeless audience to an impromptu play.

She’s just Lena. The Lena who wants to be with him. The Lena who wants to know more behind his words of uncertainty.

Shin offers his left hand again. And just like kids watching a butterfly, both their eyes fall on Lena’s hand that carefully places itself atop his palm. As if receiving a gift for the very first time, Shin slowly folds his fingers, the calloused pads guarding her delicate hand. His thumb slightly brushes over her knuckles and she finds herself almost forgetting how to breathe.

“Your hand's really cold.”

Lena agrees, slightly giggling like a chime, trying to ignore the contradicting heat on her face, ears, and neck. She thinks of saying something to lighten the mood, to evade the awkwardness in her, but her planned thoughts reduce to a forgotten song when warmth spreads from the point where their skins touch.

It’s odd. It’s just a simple act of holding hands and yet… something else feels being transmitted even with Para-RAID turned off.

She’s held hands with other people for courtesy, especially in formal events and handshakes. And yet none of those experiences even get close to the feeling that she has right now.

Is it because of that slight spark of curiosity she’s picked up from his eyes as he looks at their joined hands? Or is the way his thumb is continuously and innocently rubbing on her knuckles? Or is it because of how his bigger hand is seemingly protecting her own, handling it with so much care?

Her silver eyes look at their hands again. Her hand in Shin’s.

“Your hands are kind.”

Before Shin’s shock could even register in her, Lena’s lifts her other hand, the left one. Her palms lock his hand in an embrace as if she’s praying unto him and the smile that cracks out of her pink lips is not even something she felt happening. “I’m so glad to have met you.”

As Lena gets filled with her own gratitude and joy, she remains oblivious to the feelings stirring inside the young man’s heart. His hand tightens, gently squeezes hers and he finds closure in those muddled thoughts that his comrades surely have noticed.

An empty hand mus seek another hand to hold.

For Shin, his hand only wishes to hold hers and possibly never let go.

**Author's Note:**

> TBH this just came out of my wish for them to hold hands haha! I've got no other motivation for this one but that thought.  
> Thank you so much for reading!


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